Multiple myeloma is the second most common hematological malignancy in the U.S., constituting about 1% of all diagnosed cancers. Multiple myeloma develops in about 1-4 per 100,000 people per year. Survival times amongst patients are varied—with conventional treatment, median survival is 3-4 years, which may be extended, in some patients, to 5-7 years or longer with advanced treatments. Patients are not uniform in their need for certain advanced therapies, however, so there are additional burdens on all affected parties when advanced treatments are improperly applied or withheld.
Given the immense personal and financial burden of multiple myeloma on patients, their social networks, and the healthcare system, and the varied survival times and responses to treatments, a need exists for methods for the prognosis of subjects that have, or are suspected of having, multiple myeloma. Preferably, such methods should be capable of stratifying subjects based on genetic information, particularly when limited amounts of genetic material are available for the prognosis.